Tuesday, 20 August 2013

A 42-foot fin whale is stuck on Stinson Beach,
Monday, August 19, 2013. The whale was alive when discovered early in the
morning, but died before it could be moved to safety: photo by Frankie
Frost/Marin Independent Journal

A fin whale thrashes its tail as it tries in vain
to get off the sand on Monday, August 19, 2013, in Stinson Beach, California.
After this last attempt, the whale died: photo by Frankie Frost/Marin
Independent Journal

A fin whale thrashes its tail as it tries in vain
to get off the sand on Monday, August 19, 2013, in Stinson Beach, California.
After this last attempt, the whale died: photo by Frankie Frost/Marin
Independent Journal

A fin whale lies stuck in the sand on Monday, August
19, 2013, in Stinson Beach, California. After a last attempt to free itself,
the whale died: photo by Frankie Frost/Marin Independent Journal

A juvenile fin whale, approximately 40-50 ft in length, washed
ashore at Stinson Beach in Marin County today, August 19, 2013. A call
was received from a volunteer at around 7 a.m. this morning and The
Marine Mammal Center assembled and dispatched a veterinary team to
investigate. Sadly, the whale was found dead upon arrival.

The veterinary team has since performed a necropsy (animal autopsy)
to try to determine the cause of death. Once the whale was rolled over,
The Marine Mammal Center's Director of Veterinary Science, Dr. Shawn
Johnson, discovered trauma to the sternum area and internal hemorrhaging
around the heart. In addition, air was present in
the subcutaneous tissue -- tissue between the muscle and fat --
indicative of trauma. There were no broken bones discovered.

Further studies will be conducted, including histopathology testing --
microscopic examination of tissue samples. At this time we can't
conclusively say what caused this animal's death, but hope to determine
this in the near future.

The whale has now been buried at Stinson Beach by the National Park Service.
__In 2012 a fin whale measuring
approximately 47 feet in length washed ashore at Point Reyes. Dr.
Frances Gulland, Senior Scientist at The Marine Mammal Center, along
with Research Associate Lauren Rust, and National Park Service
scientist, Sarah Allen, examined the whale and completed the necropsy.
They found that the whale had external wounds as well as trauma
resulting in fractured ribs and vertebra, and had died as a result of a
ship strike.

In 2010, the carcass of a fin whale washed ashore at Ocean Beach in
San Francisco and a necropsy determined the cause of death in that case
to be from a ship strike as well.

Fin whales are the second largest marine mammal on earth, next to
blue whales, and belong to the family of baleen whales. Also called
razorback whales, fin whales are federally listed as endangered under
the Endangered Species Act. Their only know predator, excluding humans, is the killer whale.

I really love this. Heathcote Williams' words alert me to the fact that I've only skimmed the surface in my understanding of whales. The times we have seen whales, from the shore in Mexico and out in the sea off the coast of Maine, are among the times I remember best and treasure most in life. I have a pretty clear memory of a time when I was a child that a whale washed up on the shores of Atlantic Beach, Long Island, near where we lived, after a very bad storm. I remember fire trucks trying to unstick him from the beach, but as I recall, their efforts were unsuccessful. I'm struck by what you said about the sort of whale funeral parties that have grown up in California. All I can say is that death tends to bring out all sorts of weird, unworthy behavior in humans that we tend to try to put out of our minds, either to be charitable or because the memories are so painful and unpleasant. I was reading over the weekend about the funeral of an old friend that took place in Europe last week. It was a minor news event, so there was actual newspaper coverage. I was embarrassed and mortified by what I read and then angry with myself for feeling that way. I don't think I've ever been as excited as I was when waiting to see a whale surface and then actually seeing any part of him break through the water. That feeling lasts forever and is a great one. Curtis

I elected not to show the numerous photos of the bystanders and spectators in this ceremony of curiosity, and then of mourning. The stories of the crowds growing through the morning as the whale gradually expired, thrashing ineffectually and gasping for its last few breaths, with dogs being permitted to run up and nip at it, were not pleasant.

When we lived up on the reef near there, passing groups of whales were now and then sighted, and whale carcasses were occasionally washed ashore on the beaches. In one case, in the 1960s, the remains of a whale very slowly decomposed, over a very long period, in a particularly remote spot. When hiking up that stretch of beach, one always smelt that whale long before coming upon it.

Beautiful film of fin whale in motion, sad to see the end this one came to yesterday over there across channel (the beach now closed I hear, for fear of sharks). Another whale washed ashore last winter "in a particularly remote spot" north of the reef, its carcass there for months (yes, what a smell) until only a few large beautifully curved bones were left.

the motto of my undergraduate institution, a university polarized around science, is "mens et manus" - mind and hand - whales may arguably be more intelligent and better at agreeably associating with one another, but we naked apes are handier and having a bigger impact

Just back from Maine--and yes, the whales, seals, porpoises, and that feeling of some other intelligence . . . And I don't think I will ever recover from watching that film, The Cove. About the dolphin killing and with some references to the whale killings . . .

Even in a more isolated part of Maine, I can't escape the sense of environmental disaster. The coastline is dragged so, where only a few years ago there was a world of sea life-now there are shells of the dead mussels and clams . . . They are even dragging for seaweed now to make it into fertilizer.

But that aside, thanks for this beautiful post and poem and more . . .

Regarding your sense of environmental disaster, Nin, and more proof that we humans do not have the intelligence of whales:

“Under all report scenarios, the acidification of the world's oceans will increase—the draft report calls this outcome "virtually certain." As we have previously reported, more acidity "threatens the survival of entire ecosystems from phytoplankton [food for many species of whales] to coral reefs, and from Antarctic systems reliant on sea urchins to many human food webs dependent on everything from oysters to salmon."From 5 Terrifying Statements in the Leaked Climate Report

In Orange County they're excavating the remains of a 6 million year old baleen whale, and nearby, a smaller one thatmay be its baby, on a construction site that was to be the building of ocean front homes.

For six million years thosebones have lain deep in the loam, the curved ribs and inner ear-bones, the baleen itself that once sieved krill when the

The American naturalist Roy Chapman Andrews called the fin whale "the greyhound of the sea... for its beautiful, slender body is built like a racing yacht and the animal can surpass the speed of the fastest ocean steamship."

The Marine Mammal Center of Sausalito issued this release following an on-site necropsy and beach burial on Tuesday:

"A 42 ft juvenile fin whale washed ashore at Stinson Beach in Marin County, CA on August 19, 2013. The whale weighed approximately 22,000 lbs (10 metric tons or 10,000 kg). Based on the length, it was more than double its size at birth. That suggests that it recently weaned and was likely less than one year old.

"A call was received from a volunteer at around 7 a.m. and The Marine Mammal Center assembled and dispatched a veterinary team to investigate. Sadly, the whale was found dead upon arrival.

"The veterinary team has since performed a necropsy (animal autopsy) to try to determine the cause of death. Once the whale was rolled over, The Marine Mammal Center's Director of Veterinary Science, Dr. Shawn Johnson, identified possible trauma to the sternum area. Upon dissecting tissues beneath the skin, hemorrhage (bruising) and emphysema (air bubbles) were discovered on the right side of the whale extending from the mandible to the sternum. Hemorrhage was also discovered in the pericardium (membrane that surrounds the heart). There were no broken bones discovered.

"All we can determine at this stage is that the animal appears to have suffered blunt trauma which either caused or likely contributed to its death. The cause of that trauma is unknown at this time. Additional testing will potentially reveal other findings.

"The whale has now been buried at Stinson Beach by Marin county officials."